What an amazing sight! The water flowing from the top of the cliff has shaped five impressive upright columns fifteen meters high. The columns are in different colors, due to the metallic oxides found in the sandstone. In the area of the columns there are small niches and caves, which were dug for the purpose of copper mining, and we will visit one of them. The area around us was used in ancient times by empires and kingdoms for the mining and production of copper, including the Egyptians and the Romans.
The impressive pillars in front of us are made of Nubian sandstone, which is a sandstone with many shades of color, usually leaning towards red. It is found in several places: in the Arava, Sinai, the Edom Mountains and the Moab Mountains, it is widespread in the Nubian Desert in Sudan and in Egypt, hence its name.
Since we are in front of the Pillars of Amram, it is no wonder that the hill southeast to us is called “Yocheved Hill” after Yocheved, the mother of Moses, and wife of Amram. The origin of the name of the columns and the stream is the Arabic name of the stream, “Wadi Amrani”, which became “Nahal Amram” in Hebrew. The meaning of the name Wadi Amrani is the stream with the buildings. There are remains of ancient buildings in the stream, related to a copper quarry that existed in the stream in ancient times.
The oldest copper industry in our region dates back thousands of years. It was natural, metallic copper, which was processed by crushing and not smelting. The natural metal is limited in quantity, so the transition to producing copper from ore, marks an important technological revolution that occurred in our region from the middle of the fifth millennium BCE.
What is copper and what is it used for? Copper is a metal that has high thermal and electrical conductivity, so the main use of copper since the late 19th century is making wires and cables to conduct electricity. Great, but humanity encountered copper thousands of years before the invention of electricity, what were its uses then? They were many: including weapons such as spearheads, swords and daggers, and of course there is a lot of mention of copper in the Torah, the Hebrew Bible.
When King Solomon built the First Temple, he placed two particularly impressive copper pillars at its entrance, named Jachin and Boaz. I will mention one more place, and that is in the Book of Exodus, Chapter 38, where there is a detailed description of the altar of burnt offering and there are many items made of copper.
The copper industry existed in the Land of Canaan for thousands of years. The copper industry in this region, in the southern Arava, has been dated to three main periods: the end of the Bronze Age and the beginning of the Iron Age, the Roman-Byzantine period, and the early Muslim period.
In this video I will focus on the end of the Bronze Age and the beginning of the Iron Age – the time when the people of Israel underwent a fundamental change in their history, from slavery in Egypt to the establishment of the Kingdom of Israel. During the time when the Israelites were in Egypt building the pyramids, in the area around us in the southern Arava, namely in the Timna Valley, the Amram Stream and other sites near Eilat, copper mining and smelting reached an unprecedented scale. The mines extended over hundreds of dunams or Acres. The mining method was based on digging shafts with a diameter of about 80 cm that were carved vertically to a great depth. Each shaft was initially used as a “trial drilling.”
When rock layers containing copper were discovered during quarrying, narrow horizontal tunnels were cut to connect the shafts. In some cases, the tunnels were dug in two or three levels. The result was labyrinths of shafts and tunnels over vast areas. The proximity of the shafts was intended on the one hand, to allow air to penetrate, and on the other hand, to shorten and facilitate the transport of the copper ore out. Some of the caves were carved with large quarry picks, which allowed for the carving of wide caves. Others were carved with fine tools such as a hammer and chisel, which allowed for the carving of narrow caves.
A bird’s-eye view of what was happening here during the Israelite period, also called the Iron Age, between the time of the tribes’ settlement in the land of Canaan around 1,200 BCE, and the destruction of the First Temple in 586 BCE.
Significant changes have occurred then in the Middle East. At the end of the 13th century BCE, the Hittite Empire collapsed, many cities on the coast of the Levant were destroyed. The Levant is a region that included, among other areas, northern Sinai, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Cyprus, and the southeastern region of Turkey. The result was the Weakening of the Municipal Government in Canaan, and in parallel, the decline of the Egyptian kingdom.
In contrast to the decline of the Hittite and Egyptian powers, the power of nomadic tribes and landless population groups steadily increased. Control of Canaan was subject to struggle between the Israelites and the Philistines. The territory of present-day Syria was taken over by the Aramaean tribes, and in today’s Jordan, the Ammonite, Moabite, and Edomite tribes established themselves.
In the tenth century BCE, the Kingdom of Israel was founded. For the first time in its history, the country was not divided into city-states, but rather a single national political framework was established, which took the place of the Egyptian province of “Canaan.”
The copper industry in the southern Arava continued throughout the periods at a varying pace. Also, during later periods: such as the Nabataean and the Roman periods.
Copper production is a complex process, involving many stages and knowledge in various fields.
In contrast to the relatively simple but difficult copper mining phase, the smelting process itself requires skill and management: the professional expert is required to build a clay furnace with very specific dimensions, supply this furnace with a precise amount of oxygen and coal and a complex mixture of minerals, while maintaining a temperature of 1,200 degrees Celsius, and all of this happens more than two thousand years ago.
As you can see in the picture, two pairs of bellows made of leather and clay tubes were inserted into the furnace at a downward angle. Each worker operated a pair of bellows with his feet and to fill them with air, he pulled with his hand a string tied to the leather sheet.
The smelting process was complex: First, charcoal was burned in the furnace for about two hours while the bellows were activated. When the required temperature of 1,200 degrees was reached,
crushed copper ore, iron oxide and coal were gradually introduced into the furnace. The expert who supervised the smelting was required to control the correct ratio between the various materials and the rate at which they were introduced into the furnace according to the type and quality of the ore. After five more hours of operating the furnace and the bellows, the heavier molten copper accumulated at the bottom of the furnace. Above it was the slag, the residue that looked like boiling lava. At this point, an opening was created in the front of the furnace, through which most of the slag flowed out into a pit protected by stones. The copper ingot was probably extracted using a rod with a metal tip.
I have come across several studies that each state different numbers, so in a very general way – to produce 1.5 kg of pure copper in one furnace operation, 50 kg of copper ore, 100 kg of smelting materials, and 150 kg of coal were required. In addition, 1,600 liters of air were required to be supplied to the combustion every minute.
We reached the end, and as usual, I have a question for you – in the context of the two copper pillars at the entrance to the Temple built by King Solomon: Yakhin and Boaz, how is Boaz related to King Solomon? The answer will appear at the end of the video.
